A Caretaker of Enthusiasm

Andrea Tapia was named permanent dean of the College of IST effective May 1, following a nine-month appointment as interim dean. She oversees all aspects of the college, including the pursuit of excellence and innovation in education and research; initiatives to attract and support students, faculty, and staff; an ongoing commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging; and stewardship of the college’s financial resources.

An international scholar in crisis informatics, Tapia joined IST in 1999, was awarded tenure in 2010, and became a full professor in 2019. She has held numerous leadership roles in the college, including director of graduate programs, professor in charge of the social and organizational informatics research area, and associate dean for research.

What it means to be dean

Being dean means I am a caretaker of the enthusiasm of others. There are more than 3,000 undergraduate students, 400 graduate students, and 150 faculty and staff all questing after something: a degree, a research grant, a paycheck. They want to change the world, and it’s my job to knock down the blockages, grease the wheels, and open the doors so they can get it done.

Finding a place in IST

In 1999, our young, scrappy college created something new—something truly interdisciplinary—in response to unmet needs in the emerging field of information sciences and technology. And we’ve done it very well.

In most colleges or departments, you get like people working next to each other. Take sociologists, for example, where one is looking at race and ethnicity, another at socioeconomic status, a third at school systems—all often using the same set of sociological tools to solve different problems.

IST flipped that completely. We had one messy problem in the middle and brought in different people—each with their own tools—to attack that problem. Researchers from computer science, medicine, law, business, and the social sciences came together, contributing their unique skills and expertise to solve questions like, “How do we move medical records from paper to electronics?”

I brought sociology to that mix. There are thousands of sociologists out there, but very few of us are part of the sociology of technology. IST had a place for me. I joined others who were at the edge of their disciplines and, together, we created something new.

Growing the college through innovation and AI

IST is innovative in how we teach as well as what we teach. Our faculty members are sharing novel pedagogical approaches with other universities. Our amazing learning design team can fill a classroom with 500 students and keep them all deeply engaged. Strengths like these will help propel us into the next frontier: artificial intelligence.

Our college is leading Penn State in AI, developing programs and degrees that will generate an explosion of interest across the University. To maximize these efforts, we need managed growth, which takes on a new meaning within the University’s new budget environment. We can’t go wild, but we can’t stop growing.

Becoming IST’s first female dean

I didn’t have female role models in computing. Now, I am one, and it is awesome. I want to continue to show students from all walks of life that they belong, that they can succeed.

Being a woman and a sociologist in computing has been really tough. I faced barriers to promotion and difficulties getting people to take me seriously. I’ve been told that I don’t fit and that my research doesn’t fit (“What’s the value of all that ‘people’ stuff anyway?”). The dynamic continues to be frustrating and I alone will not be the person to change it, but it has changed enough that I am now here. I'm honored to be in a role that may help to clear the path for future women leaders in the field.

A vibrant figure in and beyond IST, Dean Tapia combines infectious enthusiasm and a collaborative spirit with academic expertise to drive progress and manage change.

Acting as gamemaster

I play a lot of games and always have. It’s a culture. Dozens of people will convene at my house and play for three days straight. Tabletop games, role playing, dice, cards and more—all happening simultaneously.

In many ways, being in academia is like being a game master. It’s ludology. It’s designing an immersive experience for someone else. Providing some but not all the information so that the other person has to make a decision based on limited information, live with the consequences of that decision, and adapt. The perfect balance is designing a challenge that is not too hard but is challenging enough to be engaging. That’s writing a syllabus. Teaching a class.

And just as the gamers at my house can move from one thing to another, so can the people in IST. Our college is not made of immutable siloes. If a faculty member in the data sciences research area wants to try out human-computer interaction, they can! We are completely flexible in our structure, which says something about the way we think about ourselves.

Being bald

I have alopecia areata universalis, an autoimmune condition that caused me to lose all of the hair on my body. (You don’t realize how useful eyelashes are until you don’t have any.) After years of covering my baldness with wigs or headwraps, I tattooed my head. The decision was driven by people asking me how chemo was going or wanting to share their own cancer story. I didn’t want to minimize their concern or stories, but I also didn’t want to feign illness or feel like a fraud.

I’m not sick. I’m bald. I don’t need to hide that. I’ve gotten comfortable with being a hairless person and will walk around in the world as I am.